


once a ghost leaves your body (it never returns)

by TolkienGirl



Series: All That Glitters Gold Rush!AU: The Full Series [343]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Aftermath of a fight, Angst, Family Dynamics, Fingolfin is just trying to find out what happened, Gen, Gold Rush AU, Maedhros is not coping well, Maglor is not coping well, POV First Person, Post Chap 14 of 'with someone who no longer is', Title from a poem by Sandra Simonds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-17 07:46:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28845543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienGirl/pseuds/TolkienGirl
Summary: There was a commotion in the sickroom, and Fingon was not present for it. That is the only information I have, for now, which makes me feel a hundred times guiltier for my neglect of Feanor’s sons.
Relationships: Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë & Fingon | Findekáno, Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë & Maedhros | Maitimo, Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë & Maglor | Makalaurë, Fëanor | Curufinwë & Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë, Maedhros | Maitimo & Maglor | Makalaurë
Series: All That Glitters Gold Rush!AU: The Full Series [343]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1300685
Comments: 6
Kudos: 24





	once a ghost leaves your body (it never returns)

There was a commotion in the sickroom, and Fingon was not present for it. That is the only information I have, for now, which makes me feel a hundred times guiltier for my neglect of Feanor’s sons. Since the attack on Mithrim—nay, even before that—my focus has shifted, slowly but surely like the hands of a clock. I do not blame myself for holding my own children nearest—for seeking out Turgon or accompanying Fingon in his tasks.

But like it or not, I am the eldest of our family here. I am the brother of their lost father. Even after a month and more of knowledge, my heart feels empty without him: emptiness on emptiness, for I am daily conscious of Anaire and Argon and my own father, too.

Especially at the turn of the year.

Especially where there is violence.

That emptiness hollows out the space not held by my remaining children, by my mother and younger brother far away. I grieve the living, I suppose.

I only lose the dead.

“Gwindor,” I ask, loitering in the hall outside of Maedhros’ sealed-tomb door. “Were you there?”

“No, sir,” he says, looking very ill at ease. “Didn’t even hear shouting. Saw Celegorm take off like the devil was on his back. The rest…well, excepting Russandol of course…they’re hereabouts.”

I have seen Caranthir and Amras huddling over their late dinner. I have not seen Maglor. I nod in thanks, and ask for entry at my nephew’s door.

He looks almost as ill as he did when I sat vigil to his stupors. His cheeks are tear-stained. He is curled into himself, lying on his side, his knees drawn to his chest. I almost wonder that he bid me come in at all, but another thought forestalls me:

Maedhros is rarely one to refuse anything. In some ways, he is the shadow of whosoever touched him last.

“Uncle,” he says. “Am I needed?”

I stumble, not wishing to tangle the ordinary words with some darker meaning. “All is well,” I say. “Or was, when I left the hall. Many of the wounded are already recovering. Those who need more rest are close by the fire, and the rest of the space is being used to take inventory of our weapons stock.” Pausing, I consider. “Curufin, I think, planned to contribute a few offerings of his own.”

“You’ve spoken to him, then?”

“Not today.”

Maedhros lets a long breath escape. Then he asks, “Who sent you?”

“Nobody. I sent myself.” This is not a lie, although Fingon did tell me he thought something was amiss. I came in his stead. “May I sit down?”

He murmurs his assent.

I sit, but I do not say anything more.

“There will never be enough weapons, you know.” He shifts, straightening his legs. “Not enough to make this right.”

“We are short of what any offensive attempt would require,” I agree. “I will settle for defense. For safety.”

“You should not have come west.” It is sharp—a rebuke. I feel a flicker of Feanor’s anger, as if it belongs to me. It does not. Now is not the time to defend my dead wife and my dead son. Now is not the time to become my dead brother.

Not while I grieve the living.

“I sometimes think so,” I tell him. “Often, indeed. But I consider my own mind as it was… _then_ , and I know how fixed I was on my purpose. And though a year ago my purpose failed, and my hope failed, yet I lived. I am glad that that man was not free to count his losses greater than his obligations. It would not make them whole, to let…”

_To let you die._

“Death can make us whole,” Maedhros says, sighing. His tears seem to be all dried up. I am a stranger again, as I was in another world—New York.

I ran out fighting. I held my own son to my heart. I led a charge that left shattered bone and gobbets of blood on the ground we have made our home. I am a stranger because I must still do much to understand exactly what I am willing to become.

“Maedhros,” I say, as if I yet retain wisdom, “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean,” he says, “That I am going to live a long time.”

I cast about for something to offer him. Without knowing what was broken in these lost hours, I cannot know what to repair. Even if I knew, it would not be my place.

I am not his father. I must only remember—forever—that in his first waking moment this side of torment and oblivion, he thought I was.

“I see the checkerboard Finrod found is gathering dust. Might a game suit?”

“No, thank you,” Maedhros says. _Refusing_. “I’d like to be alone. I am sorry, I—”

“Are your brothers in danger?” I ask, because that, at least, will cut to the heart of the matter.

Sure enough, his gaze shies from mine. “They are unhappy,” he says. Then: “I am a little worried for Celegorm.”

“I have not seen him.” I wish I could be of more assistance. “You need not tell me the quarrel—if it was a quarrel. But Maedhros, I am doing my best, while you are…recovering, to be of what help I can. You know that.”

“You fought bravely, I am told.” This, with the hint of a tired smile. I wish he had not tried to smile—it would be easier, that way.

“I am fortunate that my daughter trained me to fire a gun.”

We look at each other in silence for a moment. This morning, Maedhros’ brothers took him out of doors for a little fresh air. Did he weary too quickly for their comfort? Did they press him beyond his abilities?

As gently as I can, I say, “The shock of Christmas night is still heavy on all of us. You and I have not spoken much of it.” Indeed, I saw him cross the hall at a limping run to greet Fingon, as I tended to Turgon’s arm on the other side of the room. I should not have let the sight give me hope, perhaps. Fingon has conveyed to me, since, that Maedhros is more active and focused than ever, but that his focus has too keen an edge.

A blade can be sharpened to the point of brittleness.

“I am glad you are shepherding Mithrim’s flock,” Maedhros says. “There’s not a man out there who could lead them better. Especially not when they are frightened.”

“I’m no frontiersman.”

“You’re a father.”

I cannot bear such a compliment. Not from him.

“These are able men and women,” I say. “They proved that more than ever in the fray. If I can lend a listening ear, a little insight of organization—such as my study of business can produce—I consider myself a fortunate man.” But now I am talking about myself, and I did not intend this. “Maedhros, I shall make plain: I am worried for you. To find you alone, and…distressed.”

“I have had my cry,” he tells me brightly, with a cruel little twist of his mouth. “I don’t need a nursemaid now.”

I tap the edge of the bed with one hand as if it were his shoulder. “Can I fetch anyone—a friendly face, not a nursemaid?” Not wishing to overstep our family bond, nor to make Fingon’s promises for him, I say, “Maglor?” Surely, he will prefer Maglor to me, and he has not said that he was worried about Maglor’s unhappiness.

But I have little time to congratulate myself on my own insight. I am somehow in the wrong, for his face changes—hardens. The expression is imprinted on my childhood soul, for I saw it first not on his face, but his father’s.

“I do not want to see him,” he says. “Really, I would like to be alone.”

Before, I did not quite believe him. Now I do.

“Very well,” I say. “Very well, Maedhros.”

I pour a little water to place within his reach and bid him a quiet farewell. He does not answer me: I must walk with my failure into the corridor, accepting I have left him in a blacker mood than I found him.

“You saw Maedhros?”

I halt. Fortune is not with me today. Loitering not ten paces from the door is the brother I named a moment before. Even in the dim light, I can see that his eyes are reddened with weeping, too.

“I did,” I say, carefully. “He is resting.”

“I—” Maglor’s resolve shifts before me. “Perhaps I should sit with him.”

“I think, my dear, that he would like to be alone.”

It is as if I’d struck him. To call him _dear_ was a mistake. I have made so many this half hour, trying to help my brother’s sons.

“But it’s me.”

There is grief, but not force, behind the words.

“Maglor,” I say. “Leave him be. Whatever you quarreled over, tomorrow shall be better, I am sure.”

Maglor flushes. “He does not just want to be alone, then,” he says. “You mean that he wants to be left alone by _me_.”

A different sort of Feanor-son, Maglor. The sort who will bleed before anyone. Still marked by my brother’s memory, however. I have stared down the barrel of a gun before.

“Maglor.” I don’t wish to tell the truth, but it seems a greater sin to lie. “Do not—"

“No,” Maglor says, flinging out a shaking hand between us. “No, save your breath. You would not understand.” He turns and flees, not quite running, but close.

I grieve what I don’t know. I grieve sons I’m a stranger to—sons who will never be mine.


End file.
